ANH Jawa Stunt ION Blaster & Alternate Blaster / Tool RESEARCH THREAD
- Thread starter The Ninja
- Start date
Do we know if it’s actually supposed to be a blaster, or maybe a droid control wand or droid repair tool? Just curious.
I'm loving this thread too! Fantastic to see "new" things after all these years. Since we don't really see these props being used they really could be anything. I tend to think they fall more into the "tool" description since the Jawas are performing maintenance and giving the Droids a brush-up before being put up for sale rather than their being blasters but who knows?
Awesome, thanks for sharing what is the source of this image, did you find online or do a Screen Cap?
As we dont see these props being used I guess it is still open for debate.
I originally thought that the Graflite Flash & Graflex Clamp with Backpack was a Stunt Ion Blaster as I first found the prop on the Boss Jawa in place of the Hero Ion Blaster and it has a similar configuration, having a Backpack (Power Pack) Cable and Blaster.
The other style being the Graflite Flash & Graflite Brackets look like a simple Pistol Grip Ion Blaster, but my observations maybe way off and the props are meant to represent some type of tool, I did consider that these maybe a Droid Caller but you can see in some of the Screen Caps the Jawa also has a Kobold Droid Caller clipped to the belt.
Screencap from a Lucasfilm slide scan.
I found this very interesting Behind the Scenes photo of Gary Kurtz with daughters Tiffany and Melissa as Jawas, alongside wife Meredith, on location in Tunisia, behind the Jawa Sandcrawler scaffold prop- March 1976, you can partially see the Backpack.
STAR WARS AFICIONADO WEBSITE: GOODBYE, GARY KURTZ - A PHOTO TRIBUTE (PART ONE)
moffeaton Screen Cap.
STAR WARS AFICIONADO WEBSITE: GOODBYE, GARY KURTZ - A PHOTO TRIBUTE (PART ONE)
moffeaton Screen Cap.
Wavey sorry for the delay the Graflex Clamp from the center pin to the end is 25mm (see photo below) and the total length is 50mm.
So thanks to Ian's research this arrived in the mail today
Not bad for $40 shipped!
Not bad for $40 shipped!
They were a type of locking sealed multipole electrical connectors that originated from a WWII British Air Ministry spec for connecting up electrical and electronic modules in aircraft, and originally manufactured by Plessey (I work a telecoms company that was once part of Plessey in the distant past, and we used them on some of our in-house test equipment). They were used for electrical interconnects across the UK military, and also in many systems for civil aircraft worldwide too.
They came in 3 sizes (S,M,L) with increasing maximum contact numbers in each, and also in two main generations - the Mk4, which was more like the original Air Ministry design, and the later Mk7 which had better sealing and was more robust. They came in 'Fixed' ( chassis mounted) and 'Free' (cable mounted) versions, and in two colours - olive drab (usually used on military applications) and silver (usually found on civil applications and on older military systems, before the OD option was introduced).
The one on the Jawa Graflite appears to be a Mk7 Small Free plug with a Straight outlet backshell and cable clamp, like this:
(the backshell and cable clamp are usually sold as separate accessories to the Free connectors).
I wouldn't mind betting they had the corresponding Small Fixed plug is wedged into the slot on the Graflex clamp for the Free socket to attach onto, possibly with the sides ground to flats so it would fit (the chassis cutout for a Fixed connector is about 21mm - the Small is on the left below):
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Yeah the difficulty is matching the position of the CLOCK WINDOW and GRILL which is 4x4 thin wire and the SIDE RIVETS we can see in the Screen Caps & Behind the Scenes photos, the hunt continues.
It would not be a Star Wars Prop if they used a readily available easy to find item lol!!
I cant help but think that I am seeing on the side of the Backpack a Wild Barfield Furnace Lens that were used on the Detention Center Security Blasters, the angle of the flipped Detention Blaster is slightly different, but gee they look very similar?
Please tell me I have not made this prop even harder to accurately replicate lol!!
Please tell me I have not made this prop even harder to accurately replicate lol!!
hmmmm....
The lamp surely looks like a possible candidate, even if the profile of the greeblie on the Jawa pouch is looking more "flat", than the actual lamps seen on the security camera.
Already wrote about this...given the fact, that the prop dept. obviously modified the watchman clock cover by adding extra greeblies such as the "lamp", I guess the grill over the hole is an add-on as well.
Searched for variations of these vintage clocks for a LONG time now and didn´t find any with that kind of grill.
But I found some with a decently "correct" positioning of the hole for the clock-display.
I also think that the Plessey connectors is NOT attached to the actual key-slot, as originally thought, but an additional hole added by the prop dept. The clocks with somewhat accurate positioning of the large hole did not have any key-hole on the same side of the leather cover...
The lamp surely looks like a possible candidate, even if the profile of the greeblie on the Jawa pouch is looking more "flat", than the actual lamps seen on the security camera.
Already wrote about this...given the fact, that the prop dept. obviously modified the watchman clock cover by adding extra greeblies such as the "lamp", I guess the grill over the hole is an add-on as well.
Searched for variations of these vintage clocks for a LONG time now and didn´t find any with that kind of grill.
But I found some with a decently "correct" positioning of the hole for the clock-display.
I also think that the Plessey connectors is NOT attached to the actual key-slot, as originally thought, but an additional hole added by the prop dept. The clocks with somewhat accurate positioning of the large hole did not have any key-hole on the same side of the leather cover...
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